January 21, 2013

Temperature Rising: How High Could the Tide Go? Researchers from Columbia University recently surveyed an ancient shoreline in South Africa that was seven miles inland and 64 feet above the current sea level. A growing body of evidence about ancient sea level fluctuations and past climate changes is alarming scientists to the potential degree of modern sea level rise as a result of climate change caused by human greenhouse gas emissions. Past research has indicated that a warming of the earth’s climate by only a couple degrees Fahrenheit can cause global sea level to rise by about 25 to 30 feet over time. However, experts predict that the earth’s climate may warm by as much as four to five degrees in the coming century, likely causing a very large increase in sea level that threatens to cause a humanitarian crisis lasting possibly hundreds of years.